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Wilders is damaging Holland: ministerThursday 11 March 2010 Anti-Islam MP Geert Wilders is damaging the Netherlands' reputation abroad, caretaker foreign minister Maxime Verhagen said on Wednesday. Speaking at the opening of a conference on diplomacy, Verhagen said Wilders is spreading hatred and fear. 'His method is simple: he plays people off against one another – in a highly distasteful fashion,' Verhagen said. 'He is not looking to find common ground, uphold shared values or work toward constructive solutions based on these shared values. In fact, his approach is the opposite of constructive: by spreading fear and hatred, he is only destroying, not building. 'And in the process, he is damaging the interests of the Dutch people and the reputation of the Netherlands in the wider world. If we allow discrimination and hatred to spread, this will only lead to segregation, polarisation, escalation and eventually, confrontation.' London The comments shocked international news agency reporters, the Parool reported at the time. 'Being free to give offence does not mean that it is wise to give offence,' Verhagen said. 'Freedom of expression is not a licence to insult other people at will. Everyone has the responsibility to show respect for the rights and reputations of others. It is precisely as The Economist concludes: ‘good manners, please, not censorship.’ Diplomacy Verhagen said he wanted to improve the image of the Netherlands in the Arabic world and Muslim countries. It is particularly poor in Indonesia, Turkey and Egypt, he said. As part of this, the Netherlands has established three public diplomacy hubs – in Washington, Beijing and Cairo – which are responsible for shaping a regional approach to public diplomacy. 'Our primary, short-term goal is to respond to incidents and crises: damage control, if you will. Our secondary goal is to put our policies in context, with a view to building support,' Verhagen said. © DutchNews.nl Get the DutchNews.nl newsletter in your mailbox: Click here to subscribe
You might blame Wilders but one man simply holding a controversial point of view is not enough to damage the reputation of a country. It is the idiots that gave him validation during the elections that have caused the damage. By nick | March 11, 2010 9:58 AM Nick, I totally agree with you. Majority of us are getting scared, insecure and Wilder's & Co is encashing it for their own vested interests. They enlarged immigration and Islam as the greatest problem facing by Nederland and not the day to day financial, bureaucratic problems facing the common man. By jerry | March 11, 2010 11:06 AM A good question is ~ would Wilders be saying these things if Muslim groups along with Left-wing politicians had not sought to integrate Muslims by imposing Islamic restrictions on a whole nation. The Left cannot be let off scotch free. They are trying to convince or coerce a nation into adopting the Muhammadian laws and norms ~ and it is expected that these policies ~ the policies of the Koran cannot be criticised. This problem with political Islam not only exists in Holland but foremost in the Islamic world ~ where to challenge the rule of Islam and its precepts, its dogma, will land you in jail or sentenced to death. In the West this is unacceptable. It is not enough to say 'well if you like Muslims' then you should also agree to adopt their laws ~ and conversely 'if you do not like Muslims' ~ i.e. you are a racist ~ then you will not agree to adopt their laws. Wilders has said repeatedly ~ that if Muslims wish to live according to the laws in the Netherlands ~ there should absolutely be no problem. One must ask then why is there a problem. By Cole | March 11, 2010 11:33 AM Wilders will shout out what his supporters want him to say, and that is the real tragedy. It is the Hollanders who are shooting themselves in the foot by applauding, and voting for this idiot. By AC | March 11, 2010 12:18 PM Wilders is just using the Nazi brainwashing techniques that brought that country to its knees. He is using religious hatred to spread his "white power" propaganda. As the USA does the same for Latinos and persons from Africa, most large nations have the frightened protectionists using stereotypical insults to further his "cause". The world is heading for a war based on religious hatred of other religions and thus religion is the cause. I am one of the lucky ones who did not fall for the lies of religion and am not blinded by religious propaganda. Why have not any of these gods shown their faces to the masses? WHY? They do not exist! By Paul Martin | March 11, 2010 12:21 PM I don't understand AW's concern about "Remember the bouncing breasts, pot smoking and gay lifestyles" used as advertisement for Holland. Overall, Holland does not offer very high stadnard of living as in countries like Canada, Germany, Belgium, or France. So, it makes sense to use "Remember the bouncing breasts, pot smoking and gay lifestyles" to attract some average and low class migrants. By david | March 11, 2010 1:21 PM So Wilders "described the prophet Mohammed as a 'barbarian, mass murderer and paedophile'. Folks call the statement "rude" but I notice that no-one says it's not true. Let's look at how Wilders described Muhammed: 1. "barbarian" That's an opinion -- can't be disproven one way or another. But it is undisputed that Muhammed led an invading army which killed thousands upon thousands of persons who resisted his invasions, and he took as slaves numerous wives and daughters of the men he and his army slew in conquest. This informaiton is found in both the Koran and in the Hadith, the second most holy text in Islam. 2. "mass murderer" Muhammed and his armies did indeed kill thousand of persons, mostly men but some women and children, whose only offense was to insist on keeping their own governance and therefore resist the invading armies in their own indigenous towns and villages. That's not a crime by any stretch -- therefore killing such people who have done nothing wrong could very reasonably be seen as murder, and it was certainly done at the explicit order of Muhammed. This information is found in the Koran and the Hadith. 3. "paedophile" In the Hadith, the second most-holy text in Islam, there are two books which are near-universally considered by Muslims the most reliable: Salih Buhkari and Salih Muslim. Both Buhkari and Muslim agree and teach (in Islam's second most holy text, second only to the Koran) that Muhammed married his wife Aisha at age 6 and began having sex with her when she was age 9 -- while he was at that time in his 50's. Again, this information comes from Islam's second most holy texts the Hadith, -- and from the two Hadiths that Muslims consider the most reliable. It's pretty hard to argue with someone who says that a 50-something year old man who regularly has sex with a 9 year old child is not a paedophile. A man in his 50s who gets aroused by the sex organs of a 9 year old child is by definition a paedophile -- that's the medical/clinical definition of the term. So how is Wilder wrong to say these things? Is evil or racist to state indisputable facts? By commenter987 | March 11, 2010 8:05 PM Cole, finally a post from someone on here that makes sense. I'm so used to reading posts like Paul's that always ends, or in this case begins, with Godwin's law. There is no acceptance that one form of extremism is balanced out by another, with rational people between. Acceptance of one and condemnation of the other will not end well for Dutch society. As for your comments about the U.S., they are too stereotypical to address. By DH | March 11, 2010 8:43 PM Liberals’ intolerance of two opposing forms of intolerance: Wilders’s and Islam’s. -Life is complicated. By dromo | March 11, 2010 10:11 PM Some of you probably dont remember,but back in the thirties there was this guy in Germany saying some of the same tactics as Wilders,Germans for Germans,away with the Jews,,Wilders is saying Hollanders for Hollanders,away with the muslims,please lets start that same thing all over again. By Bob | March 12, 2010 12:58 AM yawn... stigmatising Wilders as a nazi is the typical way of having no rhethorical arguments against his standpoints. in fact, the nazis themselves applied stigmatization just in order to create resentments against a minority. if you check out the dozens of interviews he has been giving, you can clearly understand that this man speaks FOR freedom of speech and AGAINST racism. it's pretty funny to watch the media and the leftoids ranting against Wilders. there must be a reason why the PVV recently was so successful. and if you check online newspapers comments you will see that lots of people strongly are in favor of Wilders' views. By qwertz | March 12, 2010 4:22 AM As a Dutch Muslim I have nothing against Mr.Geert Wilders, but yes, I am his opponent because of his Anti Islam movement, his film Fitna (where he intended to cross the limits to insult Islam and our prophet Mohammad P.B.U.H.),his intentions to support nationalism following the history of the forces of hatred and destruction during the 2nd world war. I would love to confront him and his followers at any stage,because I love my country Netherlands and all living on her soil. During the last Local Council elections, I was leading the Dutch Muslim Party (Nederlandse Moslim Partij) here in the city of The Hague. I had the opportunity to go in to debate with the Mr.Wilders leader of the Hague in which I said the same what our foreign minister Mr.Maxime Verhagen is talking now, that " Wilders is a security threat and he will alienate Netherlands from the rest of the world (especially from the Muslim World).Which would be economically disastrous for our nation. His expected victory in the up coming elections would result in to irreparable losses for the Netherlands!! He is scared, he is desperate,he is narrow minded and someone without social or political vision (one can say "the true copy of Adolf Hitler,who had nothing but devilish powers and intentions). We the people, have to show our determination that "We will not let him move forward and we will use all peaceful and democratic options to keep the Ali Baba and 40 thieves out of the Tweede Kamer (National Parliament). We need to realize that he is not only threat for the Dutch Muslims but to the stability,integrity and security of our country. I wish one day he together with George Bush should/could be tried in the ICC (International Criminal Court of The Hague). By Khalid Ahmed Chaudry | March 12, 2010 1:50 PM This is all very simple. If you want seperation of church and state, then you can allow Muslims into NL with the understanding that Dutch law and Muslim law are very different and they will be expected to live according to Dutch laws. As you allow more Muslims into a Democratic country, they will start to be elected to political office. When there are enough in office, the laws will start to change and look more like Muslim law then today's Dutch law. I think this is where the real concern needs to lie. Don't think about today, think about 2-4 generations from now. By Tim Lee | March 13, 2010 10:04 PM If you do ANY serious, basic research (PEW center, Gallop, EU Commission) you see that the so-called "islamification of Europe" is a MYTH. By eslaporte | March 19, 2010 5:57 PM |
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Weekend: Sunny spells, max 20 º in sheltered areas. Little wind. Rain again next week
While I don’t agree with Wilders tactics, I don’t think any blame can be handed out by the present government parties.
They blew their horns as a free and tolerant country yet have implemented some damaging programs themselves, although not as loud spoken as Wilders; the pre-immigration videos showing Dutch life for example. Remember the bouncing breasts, pot smoking and gay lifestyles sent around the Muslim world? Not very tactful.
If they had handled the immigration of people from other countries more competently it would never have come to this heated point. They would not have to scramble to come up with “short term goals and damage control”. Too little, too late. They invited this extremism, so don’t whine now. They didn’t do their job and people are sick and tired of their empty solutions to problems which should have been long settled.
By AW | March 11, 2010 9:08 AM